Civil Maps’ mission is to make it possible for fully autonomous vehicles
(SAE
Levels 4-5) to drive anywhere smoothly and safely. Through
artificial intelligence and vehicle-based local processing, Civil Maps
converts sensor data into meaningful map information built specifically
to direct fully autonomous vehicles. The company will use the seed
investment to accelerate product development and deployment with a
number of leading automotive companies and technology partners.

“Civil Maps’ pioneering mapping technology is building the backbone of
our fully autonomous future,” said Jim DiSanto, managing director of
Motus Ventures. “By creating and managing live semantic maps of all the
roads in America, the company is providing a technology essential for
the leap to fully autonomous vehicles that can transform the future of
transportation.”

Civil Maps’ artificial intelligence software aggregates raw 3D data from
LiDAR (high-resolution laser imaging), camera and other sensors onboard
autonomous vehicles and organizes the information into machine-readable
maps. The information is vastly more actionable information than today’s
mapping systems and requires a fraction of the data storage and
transmission for existing technologies. Thanks to this light data
footprint, Civil Maps’ spatial information is far less costly to
transmit over cellular networks, enabling the company to more easily
crowdsource, update and share road data in real time—a major improvement
over the lengthy processes that require human annotation in current use.
As a result, the company can quickly generate and maintain maps that
give fully autonomous vehicles the comprehensive and precise knowledge
to autonomous operate safely and smoothly on all roads.

“Autonomous vehicles require a totally new kind of map,” said Sravan
Puttagunta, Chief Executive Officer, Civil Maps. “Civil Maps’ scalable
map generation process enables fully autonomous vehicles to drive like
humans do – identifying on-road and off-road features even when they
might be missing, deteriorated or hidden from view and letting a car
know what it can expect along its route. We are honored to work with
Ford and the rest of our investor team to pave the way for fully
autonomous vehicles at continental scale.”

About Civil Maps

Civil Maps provides self-learning cognitive perception systems that
replicate human context to enable machines to perceive, orient and
respond to the physical world. By combining localization technology and
artificial intelligence, we are creating a new generation of maps that
enable fully autonomous vehicles to traverse any road safely and
comfortably without any human intervention. Civil Maps is working with
leading automotive customers and partners across the world to rapidly
bring fully autonomous vehicles to market at continental scale. To learn
more, visit www.civilmaps.com.